He was a careful man. Soon after he and Frances married, the pleasant house in the close had been offered them by the dean and chapter. He spent a whole spring morning making a precise survey to determine whether, if by any chance the cathedral spire should ever topple, it would reach his house.
“Not by fifty feet,” he told Frances, and took the house.
He was a diligent man. It was he who discovered – this was the word he used – that the name Porters, which his father, the northern cloth manufactuer bore, must surely be a corruption of the ancient name of Porteus; so diligent was he that he had made this discovery already by the time he was nineteen and still an obscure undergraduate at Oxford university. Accordingly, and in deference to antiquity, he changed his name at once; besides it put a further distance between the cloth mill, which was, alas, middle class “trade”, and the gentleman he was determined to become. His delight in discovering, through the records in the cathedral library, that there had once been a Canon Portehors at Salisbury, knew no bounds. “Another variant of Porteus,” he claimed.
“Like the Poores,” he would quietly maintain, “the Porteus family may be said to have a . . .” he would pause to give effect to the understatement, “somewhat lengthy connection with Sarum.” Indeed, after a decade of saying it, he even believed it himself.
The fact, buried deep in the past, that his claim was true, that he really was descended from the old Porteus family who had fled Salisbury to escape the Black Death, was something that Nicodemus Porteus never knew.
He was observant. When he arrived at Sarum, with money but no friends, it did not take him long to discover that Frances Shockley was a favourite with the bishop, that she had no money, that she was considered a lady all the same, and that, if he were to marry her and take care of her young brother, the bishop, though he disliked him, would still favour his cause for Frances’s sake. And by taking careful thought, he even made himself so agreeable to Frances that she consented to marry him.
No man in the last, lax years of the eighteenth century was more assiduous in his duties than Nicodemus Porteus, no man more proper towards his wife and her family, no man more worthy, as the nineteenth century began, to be made a canon of the cathedral.
The ambition of Canon Porteus was one day to be dean. For of all the offices at Sarum, this was the jewel. The days when the huge estates of the middle ages produced vast revenues for the diocese were long past. Indeed, Salisbury diocese was now comparatively poor. But by accidents of history, certain offices had remained rich while others declined, and the office of Dean of Salisbury carried with it the fantastic income of some two thousand pounds a year. Even his own substantial means only gave him a fraction of such a sum.
“On that,” Porteus reminded Frances solemnly, “a man might live as a considerable gentleman.”
As dean he might almost move in the circle of Lord Pembroke, Lord Radnor, or at least Lord Forest, whom he had already assiduously cultivated. The dignity of the office, together with the income, would set the seal on his social ambitions. When he knelt before his bed with his wife each night and prayed aloud for the poor, those at sea, the sick and the diocese, it was always this unspoken prayer, from his innermost heart, that rose, pure and shining, into the night sky over Sarum:
“Lord, let me one day be dean.”
It was not surprising that Canon Porteus should be concerned about his brother-in-law, Ralph Shockley.
“I confess,” he now told Barnikel, “I confess to you, doctor, that he sometimes displeases me. But this,” he added regretfully, “it is my Christian duty to bear. No sir,” he went on, “it is a waywardness in his thoughts, a lack of judgement that I almost think could indicate . . .” he looked very grave, “a mental imbalance. I fear for him, doctor. I fear still more for his wife and two children.” He allowed his pale hand to rest on a large concordance that lay on his desk, as though the hand might absorb wisdom and patience from that weighty tome. “I have not been ungenerous towards him, and this he must know.”
Barnikel bowed his head. It was certainly unthinkable that Porteus could be generous to anybody without their being acutely aware of the fact.
“Yet my wiser counsel is, I fear, ignored.”
“I see.”
“I should like you to dine with us today, doctor, observe him, form your own conclusions. And, since my voice does not prevail, speak with him yourself, as you think best.”
Barnikel had no wish to do any of these things; but he found it hard to refuse.
“What form, exactly, do these disturbing signs take?” he asked curiously.
“Ah,” the canon raised his long arms in a gesture of despair, “that you will see, all too soon; I think I hear his arrival now.”
At first – to someone that is who did not know the canon’s sensitive nature – at first it might have seemed that all was well.
Ralph Shockley came into the house cheerfully. His tangled yellow hair fell over his brow; he was dressed as a gentleman should be in the tight-fitting pale trousers of the day, tail coat and cravat, but he had somehow acquired a small tear in his trousers at the knee, his coat was covered in chalk dust, and his cravat, if it had ever been well-tied, had long since taken on a life of its own. Of all these improprieties he was unaware. Porteus was not, but greeted Ralph as affably as he was able.
Ralph then went upstairs to see his two children, stayed there despite being summoned to dinner, for a quarter of an hour, and then, still very cheerfully, reappeared. He had not tidied himself.
As they went in to dinner Agnes came quietly to Doctor Barnikel’s side and whispered:
“I pray you will keep the peace between them.”
“Is it so bad?”
“It has been getting worse all month. Each day I fear there will be an explosion. ’Tis like a powder keg on a fuse.” She touched his arm lightly. “Help us, doctor,” she murmured, and looked appealingly into his eyes.
He would, he thought, have fought Bonaparte’s armies single handed if she had asked him.
The case of Ralph Shockley was simple enough. He had been nearly twenty when the French Revolution burst upon Europe; like many young men, he was swept along by ideals which seemed to him to be the dawn of a new world. Barnikel remembered some of the young man’s excited chatter even a few years later. Since then he knew that Ralph occasionally expressed reformist views – for abolition of the rotten boroughs, or religious toleration– ideas which, though they would certainly be anathema to Canon Porteus, were not so terrible.
Ralph Shockley’s error however was one of judgement. Faced with the towering conservatism of his brother-in-law, he was unable to resist teasing him with reformist opinions, and would do so until the canon began to grow pale. It was childish. It was like a boy bouncing a ball against a cliff.
And it was a mistake – greater than he knew.
Now he appeared. He was pleased to see Barnikel and welcomed him warmly.
Indeed, as the company sat down to dinner, there was little outward sign of tension. As usual, Ralph began to talk at once.
As soon as he did so, Barnikel could see trouble ahead.
“I have been to see our cousin Mason,” he announced.
Poor Porteus winced.
It was not that Daniel Mason, like his father Benjamin, was a Wesleyan: better that, at least, than one of the less respectable sects like Baptists or Quakers; it was that Daniel Mason was a tradesman and that his wife’s brother insisted – incorrectly too – in referring to him as cousin.
“He is not, in fact, related to you,” he observed coldly.
“Well, my brother Adam married Mary Mason,” Ralph replied. “But even if he’s not my cousin, I like to think of him as one.”
Porteus suffered in silence.
“Daniel Mason says the cloth trade has never been better,” Ralph went on cheerfully. “’Tis the wars of Bonaparte you know, doctor. Thanks to the disruption abroad, our clothiers here have the world markets all to themselves.” The declining cloth trade of Salisbury, though a poor and meagre business compared with the mighty trade of former times, had been given a temporary boost by the disruption of her competitors’ trade in Europe. “By God, doctor,” he broke out with a laugh, “I ought to give up schoolmastering and become a clothier! Don’t you agree, sister?”
Frances murmured something that no one heard. Porteus’s silence deepened.
Ralph’s attention now turned to his plate, where a trout lay.
“’Tis a rather small fish,” he said plaintively.
“It is what is provided,” Porteus said coldly.
“Excellent fish,” Barnikel said with warmth, and saw that Frances looked at him gratefully.
“Perhaps,” said Agnes, “Dr Barnikel has seen the latest cartoon by Mr Gillray.” How could he not have – Gillray’s brilliant satirical drawings were sold all over the land. Barnikel took up the theme at once and related a cruel one he had seen mocking the Whigs.
This line of conversation worked very well and even allowed Canon Porteus to soften a little. He and Agnes promptly set to work. They discussed the poems of Walter Scott and his excellent magazine, the
Quarterly Review
, the lyrical ballads of Wordsworth and Coleridge’s
Ancient Mariner
; Porteus was pleased to commend some fine prints by Ackerman of various churches, and the new and remarkable dictionary of furniture produced by the great cabinet maker Sheraton. Barnikel smiled to see how adept Agnes showed herself at keeping the conversation in these pleasant channels, and even Frances seemed to come to life.
The fire got under way slowly, and despite Ralph’s irritating manners, it was not he but Porteus who started it. It was Frances who inadvertently gave him the excuse by remarking pleasantly that she had received a letter from her late brother’s family in America.
Porteus inclined his head and smiled.
“I trust they do well.”
Although he disapproved of their connections with the Mason family, Canon Porteus made a special distinction for the Shockleys in America. This was for two reasons. In the first place, they were his wife’s own family and therefore, much as he regretted the disloyal secession of the American colonies, it was his duty to treat the Shockleys of Pennsylvania with courtesy. In the second place, they were so far away that they were never likely to trouble him. And so he always referred to them with a charitable kindness that even extended, sometimes, to remembering their names.
“Their eldest boy is away at school.”
“I am pleased to hear it,” Porteus said politely.
Now he had his opening.
With a meaningful glance at Barnikel he coolly observed:
“My young brother-in-law thinks the Americans are more fortunate than Englishmen here.”
At once, Barnikel saw Frances and Agnes look anxious; but Ralph only smiled easily.
“I can’t say I’m sure of that,” he replied, “though of course, they have not suppressed the writ of Habeus Corpus.” He eyed Porteus calmly. “But then they have no prime minister like William Pitt,” he added with a mischievous twinkle in his eye.
Barnikel could not help smiling. It was a fair retort. For the previous decade, when the fear of sedition in England reached its height after the French Revolution, the great William Pitt the younger had suspended the ancient writ of Habeas Corpus, and a number of editors, authors and preachers had been held in prison without trial. There had been other measures too: correspondence with France was declared treason; meetings of more than fifty persons without a licence were made illegal; and in 1799, the Combination Acts forbade workers to form any union or association to bargain over their wages or conditions.
Despite the fact that it was he who had invited the response, Barnikel noticed that the canon’s fingers were white where they gripped the table. Any criticism of the great patriot Pitt had this effect on him.
The doctor decided to defuse the situation.
“What you say is true. But you will agree surely that those were temporary measures, caused by fear of the French, and probably necessary.”
Ralph smiled.
“I’ll agree that some of them were, certainly. Though I do not say that to suspend liberties even then is right.”
“Perhaps not.” The doctor looked round encouragingly. “We must hope for peace at all events,” he added, as if to close the matter.
Porteus had other ideas.
“I fear Ralph does not care for Mr Pitt,” he said coldly.
But still the younger man refused to disagree.
“On the contrary,” he replied pleasantly, “I applaud him over many matters. ’Tis well known he favours the end of slavery as well as the emancipation of Catholics. Indeed,” he added cheerfully, “if England ends slavery, she will have far surpassed America in her freedoms, I’ll admit.”
It was true that Pitt had resigned when the king refused to allow Catholics to vote or hold office, and Wilberforce the Evangelical who campaigned tirelessly against slavery, was the statesman’s close friend and had enlisted his support. But Ralph also knew well that these were the two issues, the only two, on which Canon Porteus could never reconcile himself to his hero.